It remains to be seen if it’s been done in time
The Daily Beast reports on what they call the “quiet” Biden plan to “ambush” Trump.
For the first time in a long time, there’s good news for Biden on the polling front. Gradual improvements in the battleground states along with an uptick in his approval rating led one Democratic strategist, Simon Rosenberg, to declare “the Biden bump.”
The boost is at the very least correlated with Biden’s fiery State of the Union address on March 7, when he repeatedly went after his “predecessor” and made sure to mix it up with Republicans in the chamber on a few occasions.
Since then, Biden’s team has continued the punchy, combative tone on display that night, using press releases to cheekily slam their legally challenged opponent as “Broke Don.”
On top of that, the Biden campaign has continued to flex what has always been its core strength: fundraising.
With a $53 million haul in February, the Biden campaign built on their already impressive financial advantage over Trump, who brought in only $20 million over the same period. The Biden campaign has $71 million in cash on hand, compared to just $33.5 million for Trump.
The tide is turning, a Biden adviser argued to The Daily Beast, and although they aren’t putting too much stock into any recent polling upticks, the president’s team is ready to seize upon April and May as a crucial time to ambush a wounded Trump campaign.
“It’s aggressive,” a source within the Biden campaign said, requesting anonymity to speak candidly of the mood inside the re-election team. “There’s a lot of travel, there’s a lot of work. It’s all exciting. We’re heading into this final fundraiser of the month with the former presidents [Obama and Clinton], but it’s aggressive.”
Taking advantage of a substantial fundraising lead, the Biden campaign is focusing on two key areas: travel and organizing.
Since his State of the Union, Biden has visited every major battleground state—typically pairing official White House stops with separate private campaign events—in an effort to demonstrate his ability to keep an energetic schedule.
Trump, on the other hand, has only done a rally in Ohio and another in the battleground state of Georgia since Super Tuesday. Otherwise, he’s mostly been confined to his Mar-a-Lago estate as he prepares to spend the second half of April and most of May stuck in a Manhattan court four days a week for the upcoming Stormy Daniels hush money trial.
Second, the Biden campaign is going full steam ahead on hiring in the battleground states, approaching 100 field offices with more than 130 staffers spread across eight major battleground states: Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin, Georgia, Arizona, and Nevada, as well as North Carolina and New Hampshire.
Such investments mean that Biden can begin the crucial work of mobilizing voters early. The Trump campaign, by comparison, could not tell The Daily Beast whether they have made any additional hires or opened any field offices in the battleground states, beyond shifting over the same team focused on early primary and Super Tuesday states.
In an election which will likely be decided by less than tens of thousands of votes in a handful of battlegrounds, the Biden campaign is focusing on gaining as much as they can at the margins now to catch up to Trump.
Ramping up their field organizing, along with getting Biden on the road and in front of cameras to show he still has the energy to campaign at full throttle, is an opportunity they can’t afford to miss while Trump remains mired in legal and financial problems.
[…]
Not to worry. They’ve taken over the RNC and have Lara Trump on the case:
Lara Trump is releasing a new single called “Anything is Possible.” Tom Petty’s family must be thrilled that Lara Trump, who has released two versions of “I Won’t Back Down,” is moving on to different music.
Lara Trump plays the piano on the track, and, according to Breitbart News, the song contains a line from Lara Trump’s CPAC speech earlier this year. Lara Trump told Breitbart News that she plans to continue pursuing music even while serving as the new RNC co-chair:
I guess it’s just a part time job. The Trump team is nonetheless very optimistic:
Chris LaCivita—a top Trump campaign adviser who is also the chief operating officer of the Republican National Committee—rejected the idea that the former president’s team should disclose its organizing plans.
“By combining forces and operations, The Trump campaign and RNC are deploying operations that are fueled by passionate volunteers who care about saving America and firing Joe Biden. We do not feel obligated however to discuss the specifics of our strategy, timing and tactics with members of the News Media,” LaCivita told The Daily Beast.
“Democrats want to talk process because they don’t want to talk about Broken Braindead Biden and his absolute failure,” LaCivita argued. “The media should not do Democrats’ bidding and should focus on the issues the American people care about.”
The polls are starting to move toward Biden which doesn’t mean much when they are so close but it’s not as if Trump is putting it away:
The Biden campaign is eyeing the late spring and early summer to start focusing their messaging on persuading undecided voters, according to the senior aide, with the present focus continuing to be building out their door knocking infrastructure to make sure core voters show up to cast their ballot no matter what.
“That’s what matters at this point in the cycle,” Munoz said. “And I think we have a very good story to tell, not only on the operation we’re building, but also on the issues that we’re fighting for. These are the issues that when Americans go to the ballot box, they care most about, and Donald Trump is running on an agenda that people actively root against when they go to the ballot box.”
The Trump campaign’s answer to that is … well, nothing:
“The Trump campaign will raise the money, deploy the necessary assets, and win because President Trump will secure the border, make American families more prosperous, and make our nation respected on the world stage,” Trump campaign spokesperson Danielle Alvarez said in a statement to The Daily Beast.
Whatever. The truth is that the race is close and there are warning signs for both campaigns:
Jim Messina, who served as Barack Obama’s 2012 campaign manager, argued that Biden is in a stronger position to win than Trump given the cards they’ve been dealt.
“I like to play poker and I would simply much rather have Biden’s cards than Trump’s,” Messina said.
Biden’s two key advantages, according to Messina, are on the economy and the legal front.
“The economy is improving and people are feeling it, Biden has an affirmative message, and Trump will continue to remind independents why they voted against him in 2020 by campaigning from a courtroom,” he said.
Matt Grossman, a political scientist with Michigan State University, said it very well could be the case that March marks the nadir of Biden’s polling woes, but added a note of caution for the president’s campaign.
“My question has been what kind of message is likely to work this time,” Grossman said. “In 2020 we had strong evidence people had already made up their mind about Donald Trump, but not Joe Biden… Now we have two very well-known candidates, so it would make me expect the efficacy of any persuasion effort would be less.”
With two such well-known candidates and some 70 percent of the public weary of a 2020 rematch, the little things could count even more this time around.
“If it’s close to a 50-50 election, then minor things can still move the outcome. And certainly overall, there’s evidence that more contact is better, to deliver both turnout and persuasion messages more is better,” Grossman said.
I’m going with the value of incumbency and the fact that the Republicans are fielding a man who has twice lost the popular vote for president, was impeached twice, attempted a coup, incited an insurrection, was found liable for sexual assault and business fraud to the tune of half a billion dollars — and is facing 91 felony counts in four different jurisdictions. I’ll admit that it’s shocking that it’s even a race but it doesn’t change those basic facts. I think if that man becomes president of the United States again it means we actually have bigger problems. It will mean that our society has completely lost its bearings and as individuals we will all have to make some hard decisions.
